Ghost Canyon Fest Pushes Boundaries With DIY Showcase This Weekend

Ghost Canyon Fest is quietly becoming an annual must-do for fans of alternative music.

The four friends behind the weekend showcase — Sean Dove, Jeremy Brashaw, Brian Dooley and Cory Hager — want to make playing Denver more accessible, bringing in bigger underground bands that might not make it to the Mile High City otherwise. “Denver, to some degree from a touring musician’s perspective, is hard to get to. We’re six, seven hours away from another solid touring city,” says Brashaw, who plays in local experimental rock group New Standards Men.

“We want to work together and hard to make this an attractive situation to where we can bring out bands that wouldn’t normally come and not completely lose our ass doing it,” he continues. “We’ve been lucky. A good portion of the bands recognize where we’re coming from, and are cool with that and want to participate.”

It’s truly a for-musicians-by-musicians situation.

“Anything that gets into the black is going to be spread back out to the bands,” adds Hager, the drummer of native noise-rockers Moon Pussy. “That’s the main goal, to get bands here, bands that we like, and we’re trying to make it a little different from other fests.”

This year, the third edition of Ghost Canyon Fest will welcome over thirty acts, from the Front Range and beyond, starting on Thursday, August 21, with a kick-off party at What’s Left Records in Colorado Springs. Scorplings, Silver West, Viewfinder and church fire are on that bill.

On Friday, August 22, Skylark Lounge is the place to be for a lineup featuring Safekeeper, Honduh Daze, the Milk Blossoms, Neptune and Pink Lady Monster. Wax Trax is also offering a free show with the Destuctors Club and Denver Vintage Reggae Society earlier in the day.

Saturday, August 23, is the meatiest matriculation. Mutiny Information Café will host Flesh Tape, Progmistress, Nguyen, Prymek, Shiroishi and Flowting Clowds that afternoon. Then the day ends at hi-dive with El Welk, Cougars, Suicide Cages, MJ Guider, Still House Plants and Black Eyes.

The lineup on Sunday, August 24, starts with another free Wax Trax gig — Moon Pussy, DUG and BIG’N — before closing at hi-dive with American Motors, Precious Neophyte, Museum of Light, Evischen, Buildings, Glassing and Cloakroom.

That’s a lot of good music, covering a plethora of genres, so whatever type of indie you’re into, you’re almost certain to find it over the weekend.

“We love all our children equally,” Dove, bassist for art-rock troupe Almanac Man, quips when asked which acts he’s most looking forward to seeing.

Headliners Black Eyes, out of D.C., and Indiana’s Cloakroom are big gets. Same with Still House Plants from the U.K.

“I was at Big Ears this last year in Knoxville, and I went to see Still House Plants,” Brashaw shares. “Everybody in that room after the first note, their jaws dropped to the floor. I was like, ‘Oh, shit, that would be really cool to have that in Denver.’”

Don’t sleep on the local players either, especially if you haven’t seen them before. Flesh Tape, a newer indie band from Fort Collins, is a name more people should know. Denver metalcore masters Suicide Cages and peers Pink Lady Monster, no-wave enthusiasts, represent the sonic breadth on display. Then there’s church fire, a Denver punk-informed EDM-noise trio that checks all the Ghost Canyon boxes.

“church fire is a good example of one of these groups of like, ‘What the fuck is going on with this group?’” Hager says. “But it also aligns with anything. You can put them with a folk act, and they blow everybody’s mind at that venue, then put them with Suicide Cages.”

“They mix with a lot of different things and can bring a lot of connective tissue,” Dove adds. “We have a lot of acts like that that I really appreciate.”

The co-organizers are keeping the DIY that initially inspired the endeavor and have been teaming up with more small businesses that share that vision, including Fort Collins independent label Braeburn Records, Denver shop Flipside Music, Colorado Springs equipment-makers Pryor Custom Craft and Springs youth organization Shutter & Strum. Dooley’s own label, the Ghost Is Clear Records, is another supporter.

It all makes for a unique grassroots fest.

“One of the things I look forward to every year is the roller coaster of music that we put together,” says Dooley, the Almanac Man guitarist.

“Every year there’s a moment where you’re like, ‘Oh, wow, we just had the loudest, most intense band followed by a woman with a strong voice and acoustic guitar and everyone was captivated,’” he concludes. “It’s a roller coaster of genres, and we get to take everyone on a journey.”

Ghost Canyon Fest, 7 p.m. Thursday, August 21, through Sunday, August 24, at venues in Colorado Springs and Denver; tickets are $15-$25.